Sunday and busy

What a great day yesterday. I got up fairly early for a weekend, before 7.00am and left Petra to sleep a little longer. I decided on Saturday night that I would like to go for an early bike ride by myself and get some higher level training in. So I got myself ready quick and had a cuppa, readied my bike and set off by 07.30. My trip was already planned as it is one I have done a few times now, so I knew how long it should take me and how far I would go. Only this time I decided to do it in reverse. (later I would discover it is tougher this way). I completed my ride of 45km in 1 hour 39 minutes, which is ok. Once back I showered and Petra made me some breakfast, boiled eggs and a bread roll yum yum with a couple of cups of tea.

After the bike ride in the morning we had to pop into the shopping centre, Petra needed to buy a gift for her friend at work who is leaving to start another job, and for another friend who recently had a baby. We popped into Mothercare, and I instantly got a cold shiver on walking through the door, all those baby things around!

We didn’t have a lot of time for this because we had arranged to meet Jana and Radek at Troja to go skating with them. We got back home and packed our skates then jumped on the metro to go to the meeting point. Petra and I hadn’t had chance to get some lunch so we grabbed a bowl of soup just before skating, I was feeling a little tired and the wind was strong so after 12 km of skating I was happy to go find the wine cellar at the Botanical gardens nearby. We sat for a glass of wine and chatted then took a stroll around the gardens and the vineyard before heading off to Albert, the supermarket, to get some chicken for dinner. When this was done we jumped back onto the metro and headed home to cook and relax for the evening. Petra got a DVD, it was a bit crap, something about a white woman who goes to live with a Masai warrior in his village. Turns out the Masai warrior was a bit of a nutter so after about 6/7 years she left him and went back to Switzerland blah blah blah.

So today will be a rest day from training. Excellent

Choices

We have a few decisions ahead of us now, I have been looking so hard for a flat this past week, spending most of the day and evenings out walking and travelling all over prague to see places that we might want to buy a flat. I do this because I think it's important to first find the area we would be happy to live in then find the flats that might be for sale there. We have looked this week more around the dejvice area and Bubenec, also I have looked a lot around Dolni Brezany and Dolni Chabry. AlsoI have looked around Liben and Kobylysy. Finally we found a flat that may fit our needs, it's a super beautiful flat in a very green location, it is about 30 minutes out of prague centre to the north. The flat is 18 months old and very large at 120 m2, with 2 double bedrooms and a bathroom the size of an airport terminal! It has views over the countryside on all sides (the sides we have windows) and comes with underground parking and a celler storage bay. The only challenge is the price, at 5 million Kc it really stretches me. So we are thinking about this flat and if we should try to enter negotiations.

The next choice we have is what to do about work, there is now a chance that I will get an interview at DHL, where Petra works, this sounds quite interesting and give me a new challenge. I wouldn't be working with Petra because it's a big company and I would be in a different department, I'll let you know more when things are more definite. Also, a few weeks ago I applied to a job that I found on Expats website for a couple to manage the country estate for some people who live outside the Czech Republic. The estate is about 120km outside of Prague. They asked us for our CVs which I sent and last night I got a message that we have been selected for interview in the middle of August as they are very interested in us. So I am at that point again that I am not very comf0rtable with to have to make a choice between a number of things. This is what happened with WorldClass and Holmes Place, when I had to choose between them and my decision was wrong.

The idea of running a country estate really appeals to me, and Petra to. perhaps I ought not to say too much for now, and I'll let you know more when it has progressed a little.

I have got back to road cycling after 10 months on mountain bike only. I have explored some super Czech countryside and over the past 10 days have clocked up about 400 km I would guess. I feels great to be steaming down the roads again getting fresh air, seeing nature at it's best (every trip I see something great) and feeling the burn in my legs.

Horoscope

I found this on my google horoscope today, although it all sounds a little sour

"With physical Mars now in earthy Taurus, as he receives a blast from Uranus the Awakener, you Goats are primed and ready for action"

I a€™m not so sure that this extract didn'€™t actually come from a Gay Porn magazine!

Road Trip to Vienna

Thursday morning 4am start. Radek and Jana arrived for us and we filled the car with cases and rucksacks, I haven't been up this early in a long time.  For the start of our journey to Vienna we would be heading south east from Prague on the D1 towards Brno, Petra quickly settled down and started to nod off, I find it hard to go to sleep because I am too excited about the trip, after about 80km we had a short delay because of a nasty accident- the car was a terrible mess. Then at about 120km we made a coffee and nature stop. This I needed as I love to grab a coffee even though I don't normally have it in the morning at home, and always seem to need the loo.  I noticed in one of the trucks standing in the petrol station there was a small white poodle peeking through the curtains which separate the cab from the sleeping section, I commented that it was probably the truckers’ girlfriend, which amused us for a while.

At Jihlava we took the E59 south along a single carriageway obviously this was slower but it's the only way to go. The benefit is being able to look around at the beautiful rolling Czech countryside, and creep through the fascinating old villages. It seems to me that each village has its feature pond somewhere in the middle, which I think doubles as a communal bath. In the fields is ripe corn (cereal) and occasionally corn on the cob. A thing I love about Czech is how much more commonly you will see owls and eagles or storks flying above these fields and roadsides. In fact, at the weekend I even saw a tiny lizard sat on a rock when we visited Podebrady. I also watched a bird of prey hovering above a field at the side of the road watching and looking for a tasty snack, and right then as I was watching he dived towards the ground, hit the deck, and returned to the air carrying a little mouse. I was so pleased to see the activities of nature for real and not just on the TV.

We continued on through villages Zeletava, horky meziricko, litohor, moravske budejovicke (a small town) with many photo opportunities that I managed to miss, such as 3 huge statues made of rolled hay stacked together and 'dressed up' to look like a farming family complete with a large dummy in the babies mouth.




Another surprise awaited us at the Czech-Austrian border, situated between the 2 is a kind of theme park. It looked like Disney world with big statues and models of dragons and knights. There were buildings that looked like Castles and atificial mountain lairs. I suppose this must have been a place to stop of and enjoy with the kids, I think they also had many shops and retail sections for Tax free shopping

I am not sure what a 'Tiercentre' is but as you can see from the photo we could see form the road a restaurant and pizzeria named 'Dr Dolittles Tiercentre'. A pizza would have been very tempting at this point but we just continued our journey.

Much of the journey the weather was a mix of light showers and sun and the view to my right over the sunflower fields was beautiful, under a gorgeous rainbow forming a complete arch. The fields we passed were colourful and interesting. I noticed how farming methods are different and this only strikes you when you go to a place and see it, here they farmed in strips across the field, so instead of just having one whole field with one crop, they farmed it in strips and I could see up to 3 different crops in one field.

The Rainbow looked stronger to the naked eye, but I still think the pictures are pretty.

Just at the side of the road, by a roundabout was this silo, I can only assume it was convenient to put it here because of the proximity to the fields but without any other farm buildings or machinery and stuff around it, it did look rather out of place.


This is my second trip into Austria and again I was impressed by the cleanliness of the country and the good quality roads. We were only about 60km from Vienna now and back onto motorway. At about 40km to go, we started to see the wind farm propellers, some people say these look ugly but I disagree and I think they are amazing to watch and so much better for the environment to produce energy.

There were a large number of sunflower fields which because of the way a sunflower grows with its head facing the sun (hence the name--sunflower) it reminded me of looking at a field of soldiers all in formation of rank and file. This picture isn't a particular good one to show you that, but I like it because it's very 'arty'.

I switched on my SatNav around about now to help us to our apartment which it did of course without a problem. The apartment was really nice, on the first floor of a typical block, it was what we would call a 2+1, which means apart from the lounge and bathroom, it has 2 bedrooms and a separate kitchen. It was a really comfortable place and only about 15 minutes from the centre.

We visited a couple of historic buildings high on the hill just outside the town, and from this view point you could see more of the windfarms and so much of the city and the country around it. The views were absolutely amazing. In the picture below you can see the island, a long strip in the middle of the river, this is manmade and stretches for about 15 miles through the city. The island itself is fantastic, and is used for recreation, paths krisskross their way along it and it's perfect for skating and cycling. We skated here on two of the days and really enjoyed it. It's not just for exercise though, many many people go here just to relax, sunbath (completely naked) take a dip in the river and barbeque their lunch.

The trip took about 4 hours door to door, which being so short makes it even more worth while visiting again, the distance was 280km and as the weather got hotter over the 4 days, my skin got redder. I will get a few more pictures of the trip to Vienna and the lovely historic buildings on here soon.

Cycle Track RE-HL

I decided it would be a good idea to have a look at another area of Prague that I have not yet explored. I opened my map and considered which route I might take, and settled on the cycle route RE-HL which I could pick up at the Vltava just before Podoli, so I set out on my usual track down to the river from my flat. Once I reached Podoli I picked up the new track which takes a route up over the river then drops down on the other side giving you a choice of going into Smichov (towards the town) or away from the town to Hlubocepy. The route I wanted to take was to Hlubocepy, which would finally take me on to Repy. The first interesting thing I found was what looks like a newish tram elevation so I paused here for a moment to watch the trams and grab a photo.

As I followed the road along I came into the Hlubocepy area which if you follow the road Hlubocepska it runs through a village which has some nice new flats fitting in pleasantly with the more aged buildings, continuing on you ride through the middle of a forest and some cliffs and rock formations, I was surprised how pretty this area is, the road follows the stream along and if you want to you can pause at the Small parks or benches along the way, maybe even take advantage of the old beer points which look like dilapidated sheds but provide a decent beer and sausage should it take your fancy.

After you leave the tranquility of the Forest the cycle path takes an unexpected turn and travels for a couple of kilometres through the panelaks, running around playgrounds, under the blocks, and across the many small roads/crossings that link the blocks. On the way you also see where the metro b line runs over ground through a tube elevated over a small park and pond, it's actually quite a site

Right in the middle of the Panelak you can find a small pond, which appears to be landscaped, with boulders and rocks around it. Stood in the middle of the pond is a naked woman statue which considering the surrounding blocks of flats etc looks quite out of place.
However, it is still attractive and gives you a moment to rest and ponder, and maybe even take your map out again and check your still on route! After leaving here you come into what appears to be quite an affluent area of Prague. I think it is the Repy area. You can see many Villa type houses, some still under construction, and because the land here is quite hilly they stack up above and below you as you wind your way through on the cycle track. I took a moment here to admire some of the architecture of the houses. In a way all of them are completely unique as you don't see any 2 alike. I also saw a large pond in one of the gardens with a huge dead carp floating on the surface, although I didn't think you needed to see a photo of that and have spared you.

From this part you have to cross over a main road carrying trams and head up to what I think must be the highest part of Prague, once I had reached the top I could mostly see 360 degrees around the city of Prague, here also there were more villa houses and I think it was the back side of reaching the Brevnov area which had I continued further I could have reached. But I got a call from my wife that I had to come home to go to an appointment for viewing a flat.

Before I left for my return journey I paused for a moment to take a picture of this bike track that I found, I really wanted to have a go myself but didn't want to embarrass myself in front of a couple of kids that were playing there, so in my mind I leapt off the jumps and spun around the berms to the finish line. You can also see in the back ground a part of the view I just mentioned and this follows right around the left side of the photo to the direction of the centre to my right it is few villas. I traced my way back the way I had come and grabbed a couple of apples from a wild tree growing just off the roadside, they were not really ripe yet but I needed to eat something so I had them anyway.

So lastly is a map of my route, I use a GPS training monitor to track my rides and training, then overlay it on a Google Earth Map which still amazes me.

Pickpockets

We had a lucky escape from a pickpocket the other night, we had been out at the cinema and as we were on our way back we got off the tram to change to the metro and walking to the metro Petra felt someone messing about with her handbag, when she turned round she saw a women pull her hand back, so Petra had a go at her and the women was nasty back.  The bit which demonstrated how low in society these people are is that she was carrying her baby I guess to try and make her look a little more innocent whilst she carries out her crimes.   We were lucky this time and she got nothing.  She looked like a gypsy.

On Sunday we had a good trip to a town outside Prague, called Podebrady.  The town is nice, although nothing special, but we go there because they have an amazingly long skating track along the river.  We spent a few hours skating then walked into the town for an ice-cream.  On the way back to Prague we stopped at another town called Lysa nad Ladem for dinner at the pub.  The food was great, really huge plates full of food.  It was a good day, we ended up getting back about 9 pm and I felt real tired.